Originally Posted by Dugmor

MEDELLIN, COLUMBIA ? Medellin started the year with an average of 25 homicides per day in January and February. But Medellin isn't just any beautiful city. It is variously known as the world's "murder capital," "cocaine capital," and "kidnap capital." It is also the home of Pablo Escobar, the world's most famous alleged drug trafficker.

Last year, a record 4,637 people were killed in Medellin, population two million. In Philadelphia, with a population not much smaller ? about 1.6 million ? the 1990 homicide toll was 525.

And this year in Medellin started with an average of 25 homicides per day in January and February ? twice last year's numbers.

As the city's tourism director, Mejia is Medellin's number-one promoter. It isn't an easy job.


MEDELLIN HAS THE HIGHEST KIDNAPPING RATE anywhere ? so high that one newspaper regularly features ads from families to their loved ones who have been abducted.

Assassins riding on the backs of motorcycles became so common in 1990 that the government banned those carrying more than one person. The universities have "violentologists," experts in the study of violence.

Mejia isn't deterred. On the contrary, he's inspired. He says the worst days are over, the days when residents fled for Miami. The worst nights are over, too ? the nights when no one would venture out of the house for fear of getting killed in the cross-fire.

Nowadays, Mejia said, Medellin's problem is bad publicity, not massacres.

"It's true that in Medellin there is violence, kidnapping, extortion and drug trafficking," he said. "But you find the same problems in Europe and the United States."

Last year was "impossible" for attracting tourists, Medellin Mayor Omar Flores said. "There were car bombs going off, massacres of 20 to 30 people. We were in full war."

Today, police say, there are 150 well-armed gangs operating in Medellin.

The daily Medellin news bulletins can be frightening. A sampling: 12 young customers shot dead in less than five minutes in front of a Charlie Chaplin poster in a bar, six teenagers shot dead on an empty lot, a newborn baby that vanished from Leon XIII Clinic, and 12 cars stolen per day.

Just another day at the office !